Why does America still endorse the One Drop Rule?

[RemieV]

I don't understand this thread. Considered by whom? Themselves? People who are looking at them? To what end?

Maybe I've just never run into this in reality.

Half Native American, half European grab bag, by the by.

 

[fuelair]

We're all black, then.

This ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

It's one of the things I have loved about teaching biology down here in Florida - since that was categorically and completely proven by mitochondrial DNA about 15 years ago. The great............................................................................................. grandma of all of us on Earth was a Black female living in Africa some (a very long some)years ago. And our great (few less great - the two never met) ................grand daddy was African and Black also. Our color now has to do purely with how long we have been further North or South of the equator. I do so love the gasps from time to time (on one side) and the smiles from time to time on the other as the point sinks in.

 

[fuelair]

Considering the fact that 'race' is an entirely arbitrary distinction, why do we need a rule?

Hans

This also ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

and see my post above this for why it is meaningless fecal matter anyway. The science rules!!!

 

[Polaris]

We're all black, then.

That explains my enormous tallywacker.

 

[WildCat]

Considering the fact that 'race' is an entirely arbitrary distinction, why do we need a rule?

Hans

I wonder what would happen if some blonde haired blue-eyed student identified as African-American on a college application and applied for minority scholarships and such? Or if later in life that same person owned a company and bid on a government minority set-aside project?

 

[MRC_Hans]

I wonder what would happen if some blonde haired blue-eyed student identified as African-American on a college application and applied for minority scholarships and such? Or if later in life that same person owned a company and bid on a government minority set-aside project?

I don't know. In my neck of the woods, privileges (as well as the opposite) based on race would be illegal. We are, oddly enough, discussing gender quota, but that is another matter.

Hans

 

[Information Analyst]

I wonder what would happen if some blonde haired blue-eyed student identified as African-American on a college application and applied for minority scholarships and such? Or if later in life that same person owned a company and bid on a government minority set-aside project?

Ask this kid....

 

[WildCat]

I don't know. In my neck of the woods, privileges (as well as the opposite) based on race would be illegal. We are, oddly enough, discussing gender quota, but that is another matter.

Hans

It is odd that we have race-based rules and regulations and such, but no one as far as I can tell can even define what race is.

Ask this kid....

So much for the "we're all African" bit.

 

[Mudcat]

My thought is that we are all humans here. This concept called 'race' is a meaningless distinction only important for small minded fools. That is all.

 

[theprestige]

Dude do I seriously need to prove something that you can go outside and prove yourself?

Yes. You seriously do. Your claim, your burden of proof.

You can get a better answer by going to Starbucks and interviewing anonymous strangers than I can give over the internet.

As luck would have it, I was reading this post on my phone while standing in line at the Starbucks off the lobby of the office building I work in (yay Tapatalk!).

Most of the people around me at the time were regulars there--many working in the same building. Since we're all pretty well acquainted, I felt comfortable asking them for their opinions on your claim about the One Drop Rule.

Based on your recommended survey method, America--as represented by half a dozen San Francisco residents in line at Starbucks--does not endorse the One Drop Rule.

So much for your "guarantee".

Mixed people are still considered black.

Considered black by whom?

And more importantly, why? Are they considered black because "America" strictly evaluates their degree of blood purity? Or are they considered black because they display outward physical and behavioral signs of a particular ethnic identity?

My point is that they are not.

Your point is that they don't fit your definition of "black" which is narrowly, "degree of black racial purity in the blood".

I submit to you that, contra the begged question in your title for this thread, very few people in America today define race that narrowly.

Plain and simple

I think the phrase you're looking for is "plainly oversimplified".

 

[theprestige]

Considering the fact that 'race' is an entirely arbitrary distinction, why do we need a rule?

Hans

We don't. In fact, unless L.Y.S. manages to come up with evidence to the contrary, I don't think we even have a rule.

Native Americans excepted.

 

[theprestige]

We don't. In fact, unless L.Y.S. manages to come up with evidence to the contrary, I don't think we even have a rule.

Native Americans excepted.

Actually, Native Americans pose an interesting conundrum to L.Y.S.'s Mixed Race Rule.

For long-standing legal reasons, many (most?) Native American tribes have adopted variations on the One Drop Rule to determine tribal membership. Some percentage of documented Native American ancestry is required to be legally recognized as a member of the tribe--with all the rights and privileges that entails.

If we take L.Y.S. at her word, that all Native Americans of less than 3/4 pureblood ancestry in the last two generations, aren't really Native Americans at all, but rather just "mixed", what then?

Well, that would probably reduce tribal membership to a bare handful of purebloods, probably all cousins of each other or closer. The tribe would die off or breed itself out of existence within a few generations.

Now, for all I know, L.Y.S. fully expects--or maybe even intends--this outcome. After all, it does have some benefits. It would resolve a great many existing and potential land use disputes, for example. And it would open up a lot of lebensraum for us mixies (mestizos, to you pre-millennials). And it would be, so far as I can tell, entirely consistent with L.Y.S.'s insistence that race is defined as a certain high degree of racial blood purity.

In closing, let me repeat once more my Carthago delenda est for this thread: I don't agree that America endorses the One Drop Rule.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

I don't know. In my neck of the woods, privileges (as well as the opposite) based on race would be illegal. We are, oddly enough, discussing gender quota, but that is another matter.

Hans

Is your "neck of the woods" America ( assume USA from OP ) ?

If not, what is the relevance ?

It's pretty much illegal in the US, but racial discrimination is alivel well with whites being discriminated against as well as persons of color...

 

[I Am The Scum]

Actually, Native Americans pose an interesting conundrum to L.Y.S.'s Mixed Race Rule.

You're talking to yourself.

 

[theprestige]

You're talking to yourself.

Yep! I thought the Native American question needed separate post.

I apologize if my use of self-quoting to establish a running train of thought disrupted your reading pleasure.

 

[Caper]

My thought is that we are all humans here. This concept called 'race' is a meaningless distinction only important for small minded fools. That is all.

Yeah... but if thise fools gain power... then it suddenly means a lot.

 

[332nd]

Just out of interest, I'm thinking of a couple of successful british mixed-race athletes in the UK: Jessica Ennis

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=j..._4DgAg&sqi=2&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1360&bih=643

and Jamie Baulch

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=j...sYHQBg&sqi=2&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1360&bih=643

Would either of those be considered as just "black" in the US?

In the UK, both would probably be called mixed race - or white, as a lot of people don't know Ennis comes from mixed parentage. Baulch is more likely to be described as Welsh than he is black. It's true that the darker skinned mixed race people would be more likely to be referred to as Black, so in the UK its mostly a matter of appearances, I think.

ETA: Also Ryan Giggs the footballer (soccer player ) is 1/4 black - a grandparent from Sierra Leone. Would he be considered black in the US if people knew his ethnic heritage (because I doubt you can tell by looking at him)?

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=r...Ow7QbnlIDAAQ&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1360&bih=643

^ Considered black or mixed black by most people who've met me.

(In my hometown I could quite often get people flustered, if not down right angry, by asking them why I wasn't "mixed white".)

 

[RemieV]

[qimg]https://scontent-b-ord.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc3/216465_1082537233361_7591938_n.jpg[/qimg]

^ Considered black or mixed black by most people who've met me.

(In my hometown I could quite often get people flustered, if not down right angry, by asking them why I wasn't "mixed white".)

This thread makes my brain hurt...

I have never in my life known a single person who would use the term 'mixed black'. Where is everyone finding all of these people, and how are they suddenly the standard?

 

[Skeptical Greg]

^ Considered black or mixed black by most people who've met me.

(In my hometown I could quite often get people flustered, if not down right angry, by asking them why I wasn't "mixed white".)

You look like several shades of grey to me...

 

[theprestige]

This thread makes my brain hurt...

I have never in my life known a single person who would use the term 'mixed black'. Where is everyone finding all of these people, and how are they suddenly the standard?

I have been asking variations on the same question since the beginning of this thread. Have you tried the nearest Starbucks? I hear that's the place, but my results have been disappointing. Perhaps you'll have better luck.